In the aftermath of a global economic recession, institutional property investment in emerging markets has declined. But the BRIC countries, for the most part, continue to march ahead.
In 2009, as the global economy edged toward the brink of collapse, REITs and REOCs raised approximately $38 billion of equity from the public markets.
Canadian pension funds took the top two spots on this year’s list of as largest North American public pension real estate investors ranked by real estate assets under management.
The massive real estate correction that began in 2008 is causing investors to rethink how they design, implement and monitor their investment programs. In the new investment climate, new questions have risen: Did the use of leverage improve risk-adjusted performance or was it simply a tool to amplify returns? Did the early success of some funds breed ever-larger funds that were doomed to fail? What is the relationship between investment vintage period and the economic cycle?
Way back in the 1980s, Alvin Toffler wrote a neat little book he titled Future Shock. Toffler’s main concern in that book was the impact technology was having on our lives. The problem? That the flow of information and the pace of change eventually would accelerate far beyond our limited ability as human beings to absorb, process and cope with it all. The future Toffler predicted clearly has arrived.
The global recession ended in 2009, but echoes of the financial crisis persist. To mix metaphors, the credit bubble has a very long tail. In private equity real estate, for example, deleveraging is going to take time. In the listed sector, the deleveraging process was brutal and fast. Not every company survived.